The Essential Leonard Cohen

[Dem]

Dear Elizabeth,
the Zen saying is:" like pebbles in a bag, the monks polish each other".

All the best,
Demetris

[lizzytysh]

Thanks for your clarification, Demetris

~Elizabeth

[MRowe]

I've posted the review for Leonard Cohen's latest, "The Essential Leonard Cohen". I've dedicated the review to all the wonder LC fans on this site, which can be found at the bottom of the review itself.

http://www.musictap.net/Reviews/CohenLe ... ntial.html

[lizzytysh]

Dear Matt,

I've just gone and read your Review. You've done an excellent job...very insightful and balanced! You make some very crucial points, which I think Leonard would also appreciate [despite his humility]. I also feel that Essential is essential, and intend to buy it for myself, as well as gifts. Thanks for putting so much into your review and sharing it with us.
~Lizzytysh

[linmag]

Hi Matt,

Thanks for giving us the link to your review. I think you were very sensible to stick to giving a broad outline of Leonard's style and genius, and not get drawn too far into the discussion of which tracks were or should have been included.

By the way, I think there may be a misprint in the title of the last track on the first album. I don't think Leonard wrote one called Tower of Power, though it might be very interesting if he did

I'm going off at a tangent here, but your comment about Leonard's music being minimalist set me thinking. I think on the first few albums the music was just sufficient to carry the words along, but on some of the later songs, I think the musical setting is a deliberate irony. I'm thinking particularly of The Future, a gloomy prediction set to a "hot dance track", and Here It Is, that jolly little ditty about death. Your comment about the instrumentation being always perfect for the moment made me think about Bird on the Wire. This is a song which seems to survive whatever is done to it. I probably have about half a dozen versions of this track on various official and bootleg live recordings. The words change, the tempo changes, the tune changes, the instruments change, the number of voices changes, yet they are all the same song, and each in its way perfect. I can even enjoy Jennifer Warnes' disco version now that the initial shock has worn off Bird on the Wire is by no means the only early track to have been developed over the years, but it's probably the one Leonard has tinkered with most, apparently because he feels he never quite "nailed" the lyrics. So perfection must be in the ear of the listener.

Sorry, I've got miles away from your original review here. Well done for having the guts to do a review of an album that has sparked so much discussion on here before most of us have even heard it.

[Partisan]

interesting point about the deliberate irony in the music. however i think you missed the best/most obvious example. the captain from VP.

p.

[linmag]

I must admit I have never been particularly fond of that track, Partisan. Taking the musical setting as ironic would certainly make it more palatable. Maybe I should listen to Ballad of the Absent Mare and Don't go Home With Your Hard On again in that light too.